As young professionals, feedback is one of the most valuable tools we have as our careers progress. We’re still new and rather inexperienced; but as we progress we are not only expected to be able to perform at more advanced levels, we also want to hold ourselves to a higher standard. As the year wraps up, there is no better time than now to reflect on your goals and performance on the job over the last twelve months.
Goal-Setting Process
Let’s start with goals. Some of you were required to set them when you started your job or at the beginning of year – either the calendar or fiscal year – while some of you were not. If you did establish goals, kudos to you! Please pass “Go”, pick up $200 dollars (Monopoly money, of course) and move on to the next section.
If you didn’t create any goals for yourself, it’s never too late. Take some time to write down what you want to accomplish over the next six to twelve months. These goals should reflect both the expectations of you in your current role as well as opportunities for development that you see for yourself. Consider the following questions: What skills do you want to develop? What strengths do you want to utilize? What areas do you want to improve?
Make sure you set goals that are realistic, actionable and time-bound and that you can hold yourself accountable to; you want to be able to tell yourself whether you’ve accomplished them at a future date. Pie in the sky goals sound great on paper, but they only leave you feeling confused and inadequate when you go back to review them.
Assess Your Progress
Now it’s time for you to track your progress. Whether you use a notebook or your computer, write down an assessment of yourself over the last year. Write down what you believe your greatest strengths have been as well as areas where you see opportunities for improvement. Then write down how you’ve progressed toward each of your goals and how you can move closer toward them over the next six months. If you hadn’t previously set goals, also think about how your actions over the last year have helped you achieve the goals you’ve just written down and what actions you need to take to accomplish them.
Seek Feedback
The only way to improve is to know what areas need improvement. This is where feedback is critical. Set up a time to chat with your manager, coworker, mentor or anybody you’ve worked with very closely for a significant period of time. Let them know in advance that you would like to get feedback from them about your progress over the last year. Tailor your discussion around the following:
- An overall assessment of your performance
- Feedback on your strengths and areas for improvement
- Examples, where possible, to provide you with context for the feedback
- Advice on how to continue demonstrating strengths and how to work on the areas of improvement
For many, this is a very intimidating process that hardly becomes any easier over time. Some companies and organizations are great at requiring employees to take part in rigorous goal-setting and reviews processes; however whether yours does or doesn’t it is up to you to take advantage of opportunities to develop yourself professionally and progress your career.
